


Not Alone

by someslantoflight



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-18
Updated: 2019-11-18
Packaged: 2021-02-10 04:13:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21473257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/someslantoflight/pseuds/someslantoflight
Summary: Hermione couldn't let Harry walk into the forest alone, knowing it would be the last time she would ever see him. Based off the scene in the last book/movie. Edited and cross posted from ff.net
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Harry Potter
Comments: 1
Kudos: 50





	Not Alone

Harry walked down the stairs of Hogwarts knowing it would be his last time to do so. Every step, length of railing, pile of rumble seemed so significant to him. Was it always this hard to walk to your death? Could anyone really find peace in this time? His mind was racing to every moment he wished he had time to relive, every person he wished he could see one more time.

He wished finding peace was a possibility. But he knew no one could come to terms with dying so quickly. He certainly wasn't seeing eye to eye with this kind of death. Hiding under his invisibility cloak for the foreseeable future was beginning to sound very good…but he knew what needed to be done. Everyone he loved was depending on this going right, even if they didn’t know it themselves.

Harry knew the hardest part of this was going behind his friends' backs. They had done so much for him and he was just going to leave them to finish off Voldemort but with Harry's sacrifice, that would finally be possible if Hermione and Ron could kill that snake. Harry squared his shoulders a little more at the thought, he trusted Hermione with his life, seeing as she had saved it many times over. If anyone could pull through this, it was her.

Maybe giving himself up was for the best. He knew that there was sacrifice involved with everything and in the back of his mind; he always knew he would have to pay the highest price for the end of this. That was probably the reason no one wanted to be the hero: no one could bear to walk towards their own death.

Harry paused at the top of the last flight of stairs. His two friends were at the bottom, sitting. Harry knew they were either waiting for him or trying to stay out of the Great Hall where so many dead lay. There was no way around them, so he had to walk past them. But if he did that, they would surely try to stop him.

He looked down at his two friends who sat together. They had a chance to live if he did this. He couldn't let them stop him. He was doing this for them after all. Even if he couldn’t have a future, both Hermione and Ron deserved to grow older, have fulfilling lives. They had already both sacrificed so much just by being his friend for so many years. Hermione even sent her own family away into hiding under a memory charm. Harry knew what he had to do, he walked down the set of stairs, ready to face his friends.

Hermione was the first to hear him approach and when she did, she stood up to turn towards him. "Harry," She breathed, "We thought you had gone to the forest and turned yourself over." Her chocolate brown eyes didn't hold their usual light. She looked as if she had endured far more than her years. Harry assumed they could all do with a load less worry.

Harry suddenly found his shoes very intriguing to stare at. Ron too had enough sense not to speak. "You weren't thinking of going down there, were you Harry?" Hermione had to keep the laugh out of her voice. The idea was preposterous after all. Worry lined her face and Harry couldn’t help but feel ashamed. He knew it was the right thing to do but under Hermione’s glare, he suddenly felt speechless. 

"I may have been," Harry said through a thick voice. Could he lie to Hermione? She was his best friend after all the years of being at Hogwarts. He didn't want the last time she saw him to be tainted with lies. Well, he didn't want their last few minutes to go like this either.

"Bloody hell," Ron whispered and hung his head. "First there's Fred and now you, my best mate. You've lost it if you think we're going to let you leave." Harry frowned. He thought Ron would be the understanding one and Hermione the one to lose it.

"It has to be done," Harry muttered. He stepped forward towards them and continued, "I'm doing this for you both. No one is going to keep dying because I'm not brave enough. It's going to end tonight." His shoulders were set, and his teeth clenched. He wasn't going to be moved.

He stood on this, even when a few stray tears fell down Hermione's dirty face. Her lower lip was trembling, and she had to bite it down to keep her cry in. How could he think like that? "There has to be another way," Hermione told him, "We've done impossible things before."

Harry shook his head. Ron looked down and choked back all his words. This wasn't his fight to fight. His duty was here at Hogwarts defeating more death eaters and protecting his family. "Hermione…" Ron stood up and put a hand on her shoulder.

She shrugged him off and climbed a few steps to get closer to Harry, "You're not going to do this alone." Tears were beginning to fall more freely, and her voice shook. Composing herself was no longer a concern.

"I'm not going to let you die with me," Harry protested. "You have to kill his snake when he comes back. After that, you can kill Voldemort. I can't trust anyone else to that job." Nothing could have been more painful to say. He would give anything to die next to the people he loved instead of surrounded by Death Eaters.

"It's not just your decision to make!" Hermione yelled. She moved up so she was standing eye to eye with Harry, "Ron can kill Voldemort. I'll go with you. You shouldn't have to do this alone."

Ron was rather taken aback by this. Hermione rather die with Harry than fight with him and possibly live. He didn't want Harry to go alone either, but he didn't want Hermione to die either. "Hermione, come off it. He's made up his mind." If Hermione’s huff was any indication, this was the wrong thing to say.

Neither Ron nor Harry could meet each other's eyes now. None of them wanted to hear what he was saying. Harry gulped and tried to put on his bravest face. "He's right, Hermione. Don't make this harder, we all know there isn’t another way. There is no back up plan. If I don’t do this, more people will die, for no reason."

"You're the only one making things worse Harry Potter!" She cried and threw her hands up, "You’ve already lost so much for the sake of everyone else. You don’t have to march in there alone. Fuck, we're supposed to be friends, Harry." Harry flinched when she said 'friends'. It hurt worse than anything Harry had experienced.

"Goodbye, Hermione, Ron," Harry said clearly. He wanted to make sure they couldn't misinterpret what he was saying. "I couldn't ask for better friends. Finish this for me." Ron nodded in agreement and said nothing more than 'Sure mate.'

Hermione shook her head and tried to wipe away some of her tears. "You're…" But before she could insult him further, he pulled her into a hug. This wasn't something Harry would normally do but it felt right. He could at least do that for her.

She buried her face into his shoulder and let more tears flow out. Harry ran a hand over her bushy and dirty hair and held onto her as tight as ever. "You can't just die after all we've done. We've come too far so we could all live."

"I'm doing this so everyone else has a chance at living," Harry muttered as she shook with another cry. "I love you. You did amazing Hermione. We couldn't have made it this far without you."

No more words could be said to make this situation any less grim. The sounds of Hermione's cries were the only thing to be heard in the stairwell. Harry looked up at Ron and begged with his eyes for any kind of help.

He nodded and moved forward to where the two friends stood in embrace. "Come on Hermione," He tried to pull her away, but she struggled and held onto Harry. There was no way she was going to willingly let go.

"I have to go, Hermione," Harry told her and tried to push her gently into Ron. But she fought even more and tried to elbow Ron in the gut. After much struggling, Ron finally got Hermione away from Harry and had her around the waist, from behind, holding her back.

Harry looked back at them one last time and then walked out the building. His feet felt like lead, his body was fighting against his choice. Every cell in his body was yelling for him to turn around while he could but he pushed on until cool grass was beneath his feet.

"Let me go, Ronald Weasley!" Hermione cried loudly. She pushed against his arms and kicked her legs around aimlessly. She had to stop Harry, and if not at all, she had to join him. She wasn't going to let the person she loved most, her best friend, die without someone next to him.

"You heard him!" Ron held her back. "You'll only die too if you follow him." Ron had never been so confused. He thought Hermione loved him, that they had a future together after all of this. What future could they have if she was trying to essentially trying to die.

"Ronald, you will let me go this instant!" Hermione kicked back into his shin and he had no choice but to let go out of instinct. Hermione wasted no time before running off leaving Ron grunting and moaning.

"Hermione, come back here!” Ron yelled in anger. Fred was dead, his mate was running right into the face of death and who he thought to be his girlfriend was leaving him to die with him.

Hermione let the tears fall down her face without any interference. They didn't matter now. All that mattered was reaching Harry before he entered that forest! Her feet soon began to hit grass instead of stone and she was all but slipping over the damp grass.

Her side was hurting from so much exertion and her breath becoming ragged. Her vision was blurred from so many tears and dirt from battling. Her mind was void of all thought except for one person: Harry. She didn't focus on running, breathing or what would happen when she found him. Chanting his name in her head over and over again gave her the will and strength to keep running.

"Harry James Potter!" She yelled at the person walking ahead of her. The person, Harry, slowly stopped and turned around. Could that possibly be Hermione running towards him? He stood paralyzed as she threw her arms around him and held him in a bone crushing hug. "I told you not to go!"

"I have a tendency not to listen to you the first time," Harry smiled into her hair. But then he remembered why this was happening. She was joining him to die. His face became somber and his grip on her tightened. "You shouldn't have come."

"I had to," she whispered. Tears were still streaking down her face, leaving wet trails behind in the dirt covering her cheeks. She tried to collect her breath and debated in her head for a few seconds as to whether to say what was about to pour out of her. But the words raced out of her anyway, "I couldn't let you go before I told you I…I love you Harry. I've been so stupid, and I wish I could go back and change it. But it's too late now and I can’t imagine leaving you to do this alone."

If Harry's heart could break any more, it would've shattered at these lines. "You don't have to prove anything, Hermione. I believe you." he paused and tried to bite back his next words. It wouldn't matter to anyone else what he said now. They were about to die with their secrets. "I love you too, but I can’t let you do this."

Hermione's heart stopped, or so it seemed. She longed to hear those words, or anything close to it, for a long time. She repressed it for years, thinking she wasn’t good enough, pretty enough for someone like Harry, but now that it was in the open, she wasn’t going to let him just walk away to face this alone. "We're going to die together," Hermione told him sadly.

Harry shook his head and pulled back slightly from their embrace and did the only thing that seemed logical at the point: He kissed Hermione Granger. His lips crashed over hers and her hands tangled themselves into his hair.

Never in his years did Harry think he would be here kissing Hermione, his best friend. And he certainly never thought it would be the best feeling he ever experience. Every nerve was on end, tingles shot up his spine and their lips fit perfectly with each other's.

Harry pulled back slightly and rested his forehead against hers. They were both dirty, injured, tired and near insanity. But that one moment was more enchanting and perfect than anything else they had ever experienced.

"We can do this," Hermione whispered as she took his hand in hers. And so, they did. They walked hand in hand together into the Forbidden Forest uncertain of their fate but certain of one thing:

They weren't going down alone.


End file.
